Campaign for dental school to accept more students

Wookie Turner took out his own tooth after not being able to see a dentist since 2018

Plymouth's three Members of Parliament (MPs) have supported a campaign to push for a 25% increase in the number of dental students being trained at Plymouth's Peninsula Dental School.

The school currently accepts 58 new students a year, but the new campaign has asked for that to rise to 72 places - the national average.

Luke Pollard, Fred Thomas and Rebecca Smith have signed a letter to Health Secretary Wes Streeting, calling for additional places.

Pollard, who represents the dental school's Devonport base, said: "The crisis in dentistry has been decades in the making but there simply isn't a fix that doesn't involve training more dentists."

He added: "We [Plymouth] are brilliant at this and that's why I want to see a huge increase in student places at our dental school to train the next generation of South West dentists."

Wookie Turner, who said he had not been able to see an NHS dentist since 2018 due to the Covid-19 pandemic, said he had to remove one of his own teeth after a top right molar had a "huge cavity".

He said: "I had to break my tooth up with a pair of pliers and pull parts of my teeth from my gums.

"I did the best I could with whatever I had in the drawer at the time.

"I've given up. I even considered going to the student dentists, but even they were fully booked.

"It is so expensive - going to a dentist is considered a luxury," he told John Acres at Breakfast on BBC Radio Devon.

'Optimise patient care'

Professor Ewen McColl, head of Peninsula Dental School, said: "The recently released 10-year Health Plan for England puts community, prevention and use of digital innovation at the centre of the future NHS. 

"University of Plymouth's Peninsula Dental School has this ethos at the heart of all we do. 

"Our community-based clinics serving rural and coastal communities across the South West focus on educating our students on prevention, whilst utilising digital workflows to optimise patient care."

Earlier this week, Streeting refused to set out a timetable to fulfil one of Labour's main manifesto election promises, reforming the dental contract - the framework which pays NHS dentists.

However, despite beginning talks with the British Dental Association (BDA) a year ago, Streeting told the BBC that "unless I am 100% certain I can achieve the promise, I don't make it".